A RENFREW man who attacked a notorious Paisley gangster with weapons has been cleared of all wrongdoing - because he was mentally ill. 

Stephen Cunningham, 33, attacked convicted drug dealer Grant Mackintosh, 62, at his home in Renfrew.

It’s understood Cunningham, who lived in the same block of flats as Mackintosh, wrongly believed Mackintosh had abducted his girlfriend.

But Cunningham did not have a girlfriend and had the mistaken belief about Mackintosh due to his paranoid schizophrenia and alcohol abuse. 

Believing Mackintosh had his girlfriend locked within his flat in Ferguson Street, Cunningham crashed through the door wielding a knife and a hammer, on Tuesday, December 19, 2017, and began attacking the convicted gunman.

Mackintosh suffered a head injury during the attack.

Cunningham spent nine days in hospital, and first appeared in the dock at Paisley Sheriff Court in connection with the case on December 29, 2017. 

At a pre-trial hearing last month, defence solicitor Alastair Gray said Cunningham’s pleas of not guilty would be accepted by prosecutors, and at a pre-trial hearing on Friday, his pleas of not guilty were accepted, after Dr Gavin Reid, a consultant forensic psychiatrist at the Rowanbank Clinic, told Procurator Fiscal

Depute David McDonald he was satisfied Cunningham carried out the attack due to his mental illnesses.

Sheriff Tom McCartney then made Cunningham the subject of a Compulsion Order and Restriction Order under mental health legislation, meaning he will be held in hospital.